Despite encouraging sales growth, the association predicts this year will be “ultra competitive”

The rate of retail sales growth is pointing to a ‘maturing market’, figures from the IMRG Capgemini e-Retail Sales Index suggest.

UK online retail sales were up 12.1% on average year-on-year (YoY) in 2017, which was lower than the IMRG’s forecast of 14%. This figures also falls short of 2016’s YoY average of 15.9%.

In 2017, only March and April showed notably stronger YoY growth than the previous year.

This is consistent with a ‘three-year-bounce’ pattern of growth identified by the IMRG, which showed peaks starting in 2010 and repeating in 2013 and 2016. The association suggests that if 2018 follows this pattern, a new stimulus should be entering or proliferating the market during 2019.

“That said, 2018 does look set to be a transformational year for retail – with an increasing use of AI services anticipated plus the rise of ‘browserless commerce’ (through devices such as voice assistants).

“It may be that we see shopper behaviour shift significantly over the coming period.”